Then he drops to my ankles, his hands shaking as he frees me. Saint Solomon Masters can shoot a man without blinking, can break bones with calm hands, can turn rage into a system andcall it order. But he’s kneeling in front of me with blood running down his side, cutting me free with hands that can’t stay steady.
“Sín,” he whispers.
Just my name.
It breaks me worse than anything Canon did.
The moment the straps fall away, my body tips forward because it no longer remembers how to hold itself upright. Saint catches me before I hit the floor. He gathers me against him too quickly, then immediately gentles when the sound I make goes through him. One arm locks around my back as the other comes up to cradle the side of my head, fingers spread carefully around my swollen eye, not touching the worst of it, hovering like he’s afraid even air might hurt me if it comes from him.
“I had no choice,” I mutter, tears gathering in my eyes. “I tried… but I couldn’t…” The words have been sitting in my mouth since the first piece slipped out. I need him to know before anyone else says anything that I never meant anyone to get hurt. “Saint, I tried. I didn’t want to. I tried to keep it back.”
His hand tightens in my hair, just enough to anchor me. “If I thought you did, I wouldn’t have come for you.”
I stare at him through the blur of one good eye and one swollen almost-shut. A sob tears out of me so suddenly it hurts my ribs.
Saint’s face twists in agony. “I’ve got you.”
He starts to lift me, the movement pulling pain through every part of me at once. I gasp, my hands clawing weakly at his shoulders. He freezes immediately, his jaw clenching hard enough to change the shape of his face.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers against my temple. “Fuck, I’m so sorry.”
Behind him, Varina makes a sound. I look past his shoulder and find her still near the bench, crying openly now, one hand pressed to her mouth with Ash’s gun to her temple. Nearlyeveryone else is dead or close to it, though none of them are my concern.
Varina takes one step toward me. “Oisín, I’m so sorry.”
Saint chuckles, the look he gives her is worse than any shouted threat. “Don’t.”
Her face crumples. “I didn’t know it would—”
“You stayed,” I whisper. “You told me I should have just given in. I don’t care if you didn’t touch me. You. Stayed.”
I close my eyes because I can’t carry her apology right now. It’s too late, too heavy, too full of everything she should’ve done before the first hit landed. Some part of me knows those tears are only for show, anyway, that she’s not actually apologizing. She’s just trying to save her skin. Saint shifts me carefully in his arms, a tremor running through him when my body goes limp against his chest.
“We’re leaving,” he states, daring Varina to fight that. She has to know she’s lost everything, that there’s no coming back from all of this.
When her gaze dips to Rook a little too long, I wonder if there had been something more between them. Not that it matters now. The men she thought she knew, trusted, and stood beside are gone.
Saint hums against my temple as he carries me outside, the shudder that runs through me due to the night air making Saint tighten his grip on me. He loosens it in the next second as we make it to the car, Bricks strolling up to meet us. He’s dripping in blood, gun in one hand, his chest heaving, and the light in his eyes gone. If he wasn’t on our side, I’d be terrified.
Bricks holds out a phone with his other hand, a grim smile spreading across his face. “Someone wants to speak with you.”
I frown, confused when Sol’s voice comes through the speaker. “Did you get what you came for?”
Saint snorts. “I took back my husband, the man theystolefrom me. Yes and we’re coming home.”
“The bloodshed you no doubt caused was unnecessary. Moth mentioned that the run this evening…”
Saint adjusts his hold on me with care that doesn’t match the violence in his voice. “If you ever fought for Mom, maybe you’d understand.” Saint’s breathing is rough against my temple, and I can feel the blood from his side soaking warm into my shirt where he holds me. “But you’ve never loved anything,” Saint says. “I’m not even sure you love Obsidian.”
The voice on the other line goes silent before Sol clears his throat. “Love is weakness.”
Saint laughs once, though there’s no humor in it. “No. Weakness is calling from the fucking clubhouse or wherever you are while I rescued what was most important to me and still thinking the lesson matters more than the life.”
Sol clears his throat again. “That boy is the reason—”
“That man is myhusband.” Saint’s voice cracks on the word. “And if you finish that sentence, I’ll put you in the ground beside Canon and let the club decide which of you disgusts them more.”
“You… you killed him?”
